12:15 pm - Tue, Mar 6, 2012

1 note

Tasting The Circle Nightclub Pt. 1

Friday March 24nd, 2012

Music provided by: Jesse Macro, DJ Benjamin, and DJ Nak

Circle is a Korean night club close to Times Square and Bryant park on 41st street.  The club is notorious for turning away non-Korean attendees and has an undocumented very hard to enter door.  Women were free before midnight but guys were required to pay a $20 entrance fee.  Coat and bag check was also mandatory costing $4 an item.  A Corona cost $8 and gratuity was automatically added if paying with a credit card. 

* Is that a giant diamond encrusted nipple…?

Here’s what our “Tasters” thought.  Click the Names to find out more about them.                                         

earlyBIRD : Be forewarned when it comes to club start times.  They’re always wrong.  In the case for Circle : Facebook page said 9.  Flyer said 10.  They actually started letting people in at 11.

Like we mentioned above, Circle is known for denying entrance to anyone not of Korean decent.  I’ve tried on one occasion before and was told there was a “private party” going on.  I think what helped this evening was the fact that we got there very early (we were told by the doorman that they would open in another 15 minutes) and one of the tasters is actually Korean.  So maybe we had a slight advantage with getting in this time but if you are of non-Asian variety, I’m sure you’ll have to know someone on the inside to actually get in.   Or come with a large group of Asian people.  We saw some random white people scattered here and there.   But VERY VERY few.

So yes, we penetrated Circle tonight.

Virgin:  Now for a cultural lesson.  In Korea, it’s not very common to just approach someone in a club or bar and start talking to them.  So what guys do is have waiters talk to the girls for them.  Here is an example of how it goes down.

A table of guys will look over and see a table of girls.  If the guys are interested in said table, they will ask one of the waiters to approach the female party and ask them if they would like to join the gentlemen.  If the girls accept, they are all then escorted to the men’s table and drinks are usually poured for the new guests. 

This may sound weird from an American standpoint but from a more conservative culture, this helps save face in the way of embarrassment if the girls declined the offer.  Or if you’re just that shy.

Circle does not have any seating area unless you are in the VIP section.  There are two small tables next to the bars but good luck getting those seats.  They will be sought after by many tired dancers throughout the evening.  The dance floor in wedged between two types of VIP areas, one on the ground floor, 2 on the second floor, and 2 individual tables on the sides of the DJ booth.

One of the other unique things about Circle is that its VIP sections are hosted by male servers.  As most of you know, this is usually done by a girl at any other NYC venue. These boys are there to serve alcohol and like I mentioned before, act as a liaison for guys seeking female company.   

earlyBIRD : As usual there weren’t many people here because we had arrived so early.  About 10 people were all huddled together at one of the bars taking pictures while we stood at the opposite bar and just took in the sights.  Probably around 12 - 12:30 is when people finally started to pack in.

SWIRL:  The opening DJ was playing your average variety hits but they felt a little dated at this point.  Black Eyed Peas and Katy Perry?  Maybe he didn’t want to interfere with anything that would be playing later?  Well if that was the case, then it back fired however because we definitely heard Rhianna from 2 different DJs that night.  Perhaps some sort of set list collaborating? 

One of the more interesting things about the music set up here is that they have a live electronic drummer accompanying the DJ.  He’s basically free styling along to the tunes.  I thought this was pretty cool, but at times it was hard to tell if his beats were part of the song, or if they were something already put into the remix ahead of time.

Like the Asian crowd at District 36, people at Circle were pretty good with not bunching up so tightly on each other.  I like being on the dance floor and not being sardined.

virGIN:  So I was trying to figure out what was going to make this place stand out.  Sure it was exclusive to a certain minority and they had their own unique server setup but did it have anything else going for it?  Elaborate chandeliers are common place and pole dancers are becoming a staple in the night life scene.  And then it hit us.  Literally.

Suspended high about the DJ booth are what look like 2 fire extinguisher tubes pointed down at the crowd.  Suddenly around 1:30 a loud sharp fissure like noise rang out and the place started filling up with fog.  Now we’re definitely no strangers to fog but here’s the catch.

The fog filled up the ENTIRE venue ! and it was cold !

I was dancing with earlyBIRD when we started to become engulfed in the chilly cloud.  He wasn’t even more than a foot away from me and I could NOT see him.  This was really fun.  Sadly it didn’t last very long and we were once again in the presence of everyone around us.

SWIRL:  Ok I want every club to have fog machines like these now.

earlyBIRD: Agreed.

Continued in Pt. 2